Education for Sustainable Development: The Use of a Competence-Based Approach in an English as a Foreign Language (EFL) Writing Course at a University in Saudi Arabia

Abstract

Sustainable development and education for sustainable development (ESD) are crucial and interconnected topics under wide discussion today. Young adults need to be educated in how to help bring about change. Thus, the dynamic relationship between school and home is important. In education, use could be made of English language classes, especially since English is a global language that enables access to the literature on sustainability and facilitates discussion in global conferences and meetings. Consequently, English as a foreign language (EFL) undergraduate students could gain confidence from being able to understand and use the terminology of, for example, sustainability. In this paper, the use of competence-based language teaching (CBLT) is proposed as a means of introducing sustainability topics into EFL writing classes at a university in Saudi Arabia. Student competence in sustainable development is therefore considered based on students’ ability to write about suggested sustainable development topics, measured in a survey against five dimensions of ESD that were proposed by Michelsen and Fischer. The results demonstrate that the students possessed competence in sustainable development and intended to participate in its implementation. Thus, recommendations for the stakeholders in the education sector include sustainable development topics as an initial offering in the curricula of various specialties using the CBLT approach.